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Editorial: Housing action is what we need

A reader contacted us this week to tell us that her worst nightmare had happened: the owners of the house she rented had decided to retire and wanted to move in on May 1.
housing

A reader contacted us this week to tell us that her worst nightmare had happened: the owners of the house she rented had decided to retire and wanted to move in on May 1. She was now “desperately searching for a house for my family of four” and the prospects weren’t good. She added that she couldn’t let her 83-year-old mom become homeless.

In a follow-up email, written after she had connected online with others in similar straits, her tone was apocalyptic. She told us she’d learned that people with summer homes, including some from Alberta, were moving here permanently and “we have dozens of people about to become homeless here, roughly by June or July.”

She predicted what was coming would hit the community “like a tornado out of control.”

It was all anecdotal, but believable.

The Sunshine Coast has become inhospitable to renters. It didn’t happen overnight, but it seems to keep getting steadily worse.

At the same time, the option of buying a home becomes less viable for more and more people.

The February stats from the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver showed that the benchmark price on the Sunshine Coast rose by a phenomenal 32.7 per cent year-over-year. Only Bowen Island, at 34.4 per cent, is in the same ballpark.

Despite only 91 listings, February saw 71 detached home sales on the Coast, with a median selling price of $800,000. It’s still the lowest price in the Metro region but it’s a giant leap from the median price of $586,500 just one year ago, when only 31 single-family homes sold. Supply is scarce everywhere, but the Coast ranks in the top three for percentage of sales to listings in the region.

This week’s “call to action” on housing by local governments and community organizations is a welcome development for the Sunshine Coast. Bringing everyone to the table and focusing on “action and forward momentum” is the right approach. The group is utterly correct in saying, “This housing crisis is the single greatest threat to equitable and sustainable communities as well as economic development on the Sunshine Coast.”

But there is no time left to waste. As our Cassandra-like reader said about the dire rental situation: “This community is in big trouble. Anger and fear is high and we have no way to help these people. We don’t even have a park they can camp in. We need all levels of governments’ assistance now. Crime will escalate, mental illness will soar and honestly, all hell will break loose.”

At that stage, talking about action will not do the job. Action now is what we need.